Christian Forums and Message Board

Who are the "We" assigned by yourself to try to speak for?

All long time members here who I know well.

Please let go of what happened in your marriage and you may be able to be free form all this anger at last that you take out on everyone else. You are such an angry person.

The Rich man and Lazarus is a real event, a prophecy, hidden in the form of a parable. What real event? The raising of Lazarus by Jesus. "Father Abraham" did, after all, send Lazarus back to earth as a warning to the Sadducees, but just as Jesus said, even if one came back from the dead, they would not listen. The prophetic parable is probably not meant to give us much real information about Heaven or Hell.

Except for the last sentence, I can't agree.

I don't see anybody being raised in the Luke 16 parable, Father Abraham doesn't have the authority to send anybody back, and the Lazarus of John 11 and 12 doesn't fit the description of a poor man covered in sores and being laid at somebody's gate, while his sisters seem to be doing pretty well.

How was it?

Well, the Lazarus story is a parable, and the setting is spiritual, so it sounds a bit figurative to me.

Yeah, that's why I mentioned that it could be figurative. I have read points from some on that story that could go the other way.

"Fear not them which kill the body, but are not able to kill the soul: but rather fear him which is able to destroy both soul and body in hell."


But this though, "both soul and body". Body is physical, you think God gives them a resurrected body then destroys it? Spirits dont have a body, then again this verse doesn't mention a spirit. The body that sons of God recieve is an incoruptable body. So then this verse may also be figurative. I have a hard time accepting the idea of the lost being tortured without end for not believing. Destroy as in to put an end to; extinguish. Eternal life is a gift we are not born with it.

but then theres this.

And the third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice, If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead, or in his hand,

The same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation; and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb: And the smoke of their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever: and they have no rest day nor night, who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name. -Rev. 14:11

Unless these are apostates who have been born again at one point?  Or this is figurative also. "in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb:" "he" in the presence of.  And the smoke of "their" torment ascendeth up and "they" have no rest.

Say, Norton:

   In reference to "spirit" and "soul," I suggest you research my recent columns on the subject for a different, and perhaps even better, view. You will find them here on the GraceCentered Forum. Below is a portion of one of those columns.
________

   Here are my observations. Many bodies of the saints were resurrected, not at Jesus’ death, but “after His resurrection.” The names of the saints are not mentioned. As to whom they “appeared to” in Jerusalem is not stated. Nor is it revealed why they were raised and appeared to many. My consensus is that by appearing to many, they demonstrated a future resurrection for all of God’s saints.
 
    Yet there are mysteries associated with this momentous occurrence. Did these resurrected saints die again? We assume they did. But if not, it may have been that they—their spirits or real selves—were simply called from their celestial “residence” to repossess their bodies and appear to many as a manifestation of a collective future resurrection—at which time they then returned to the unseen abode of departed spirits to await the general resurrection.
 
    As to Lazarus, my take is that his spirit, the actual Lazarus, was called from the province of departed spirits and reunited with his biological remains when Jesus summoned both from the tomb.
 
    As I have previously advocated, and demonstrated from many scriptures, the nucleus of a person is his/her spirit. The same was true of Jesus. At biological death He “yielded up His spirit”—the authentic Jesus. His spirit, the real Jesus, “was not abandoned to Hades [unseen abode of departed spirits], nor did His flesh see corruption” [Peter, in Acts 2:31]. Two substances or articles are mentioned here—spirit and flesh. [See Thayer & Strong on “Hades” in Acts 2:31.]
 
    When Steven was being stoned to death by religious sectarians, he cried out, “Lord Jesus, receive my spirit!”—Acts 7:59. “Breath” is not meant here, as per the Greek. Steven’s center or core was his spirit, not his breath or his flesh. A believer’s flesh decays. A believer’s spirit continues to live after physical death.
 
    Do you recall how our Lord was troubled at the tomb of Lazarus? He became very emotional and wept. The record says, “When Jesus saw her [Mary] weeping, and the Jews who had come with her also weeping, He was deeply moved in his spirit and greatly troubled” [John 11:33].
 
    Jesus was both flesh and spirit, as we all are. I looked this verse up in Thayer’s Greek Lexicon, and he details “spirit” as “to strike one’s spirit with fear and dread.” The point is when any of us become troubled, our inner self, the spirit, experiences distress or grieve. We are more than flesh, bones, and blood. We have an inner core called “spirit”—the very essence of a person, for “the body without the spirit is dead” [James 2:26].
 
    The Lord gives us “a spirit of wisdom and of revelation in the knowledge of Him” [Eph. 1:17]. No, not a “breath” of wisdom! Only the inner man—his spirit—can know wisdom and knowledge. His flesh and breathing apparatus are incapable of deciphering or understanding either.

Buff